Annie Potts as Mary Jo Shively, the Second

Have you seen the new show "GCB" on ABC? It's on Sunday nights at 9pm (Central), and it's about this woman who was a mean girl in high school, but has had to return home to Dallas to live with her mother after her husband runs his car off the road (while being sexually pleasured by his mistress) after embezzling a ton of money. Oh, and have I mentioned that it's a soap opera?

Anyway... The main character is played by Leslie Bibb who, once upon a time, played a mean girl on the TV show "Popular." And while she's disgusted by her treatment by the people she may or may not have stepped on on her way up the social-climbing ladder, she's also not against playing their games to get back to an even footing.

Most notably, she's using the church as her pulpit for getting even. (In the second episode, which is still on right now, she is said to have "out-Christianed" her primary nemesis.)

The show has some promise. It's apparently based on a book called "Good Christian Bitches" (hence the "GCB"), and among other things has a whole lot of side activity - like very attractive male cast members, a couple of whom just happen to be having an illicit gay affair.

But back to my main point.

Along with the primary cast (the nemesis is played by Kristen Chenowith), our heroine's mother is played by Annie Potts - who those of us of a certain age will always know as Mary Jo Shively on "Designing Women." And I'm guessing that's also how the writer of the show remembers her, because Gigi Stopper (her "GCB" character) has had moments of Mary Jo (and Julia) in each of the first two episodes.

And, while I'm enjoying the show on its own merits, I have to admit that seeing her - in a little bit of both time frames - is making the show completely worth my Sunday night time.